It is well-known that fiber is an important part of the diet of mammals, particularly humans. Medical and nutrition professionals generally agree that dietary fiber is essential for good human health. Too little fiber in the diet is associated with diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, obesity, and colon cancer. In addition, too little fiber often results in intestinal irregularity. Proper amounts of fiber in the diet stimulate bowel movement, slow down the gastrointestinal transition and digestion processes, modify fat absorption, and increase excretion of bile acids. In addition, some dietary fibers are known to lower blood cholesterol and benefit the postprandial (after eating) glycemic response. In addition, various types of fiber and/or fiber components, for example, moderately fermentable fiber that is fermented by the intestinal flora of a user, has been shown to promote the growth and/or development of lactic acid bacteria in the gastrointestinal tract of a user, at the expense of pathogenic bacteria, thus providing benefit to the user's gastrointestinal tract.
However, it has also been documented that the average person in the United States does not eat enough dietary fiber, and often eats only about half of the recommended amount of fiber daily. Fiber intake can be increased by eating greater amounts of foods high in fiber such as grains, fruits, and vegetables. However, most consumers would have to almost double their intake of such foods to attain the recommended daily amount of fiber. Many consumers are unwilling or unable to eat large amounts of high fiber foods, and thus often look for supplements to provide the additional needed fiber.
To date there are several types and brands of fiber supplements available including powders, tablets, capsules, biscuits, breakfast cereals, laxative beverages, and the like. However, many of these compositions have certain drawbacks and are not easily accepted by consumers due to various factors such as the lack of portability, for example of powders or beverages; the unpleasant taste, and texture and/or mouthfeel of many fiber containing materials; high calories of the supplement resulting from materials used to mask the taste and/or texture of the fiber; and excess gas produced in the user by many of the fiber containing materials. In addition, flavoring, taste masking, and texture enhancing materials added to the fiber supplement products result in a lessened amount of fiber that can be included in each unit of product. Therefore, consumers must ingest increased amounts of product to obtain the desired amounts of fiber. Such unpleasant and/or inconvenient properties often result in the user discontinuing use of the product.
Recently there have been attempts to formulate fiber into a palatable, easily ingestible confectionary-type article, such as a soft chew. However, such chews are generally difficult to manufacture due to the propensity of the presence of too much fiber to result in a confection that is too hard and/or brittle for general consumer acceptance. Thus, many of the currently available confection-type products suffer from many of the noted drawbacks such as unpleasant taste and mouthfeel, high calories, and many also contain relatively small amounts of fiber, therefore requiring that the user ingest several units of product per day in order to obtain the desired amount of fiber.
Therefore, there remains a need for a palatable, low calorie, consumer acceptable, composition that can provide high amounts of fiber, as well as methods of making and using such a composition.